
As with every play we read this quarter, we started A Midsummer
Night s Dream with only a text. Reading the script is the foundation of
Shakespeare, and the least evolved of the ways that one can experience
it. There is no one to interpret the words, no body movement o!r voice
inflection to indicate meaning or intention. All meaning that a reader
understands comes from the words alone. The simplicity of text provides
a broad ground for imagination, in that every reader can come away from
the text with a different conception of what went on. The words are
merely the puzzle pieces individuals put together to bring coherence and
logic to the play. 
Although we all read generally the same words, we
can see that vastly different plays arise depending on who interprets
them. By interpreting the word-clues that Shakespeare wrote into the
script to direct the performance of the play, we were able to imagine
gestures, expressions, and movements appropriate to the intention of the
playwright. An example of this can be seen in the different Romeo and
Juliets: Luhrman clearly had a more modern vision after reading the
script than did Zeffirelli did only 18 years before. The live
performance at the CalPoly theatre also carried !with it a very
different feel less intense, more child-like and sweet with nearly the
same words. Reading also affects our experience in that without the
text, we would most likely not be able to enjoy Shakespeare at all;
having the text makes Shakespeare widely accessible (available for free
on the web) to all that desire it. Once the script is obtained, anyone
can perform Shakespeare even everyday, non-actor citizens put on
Shakespeare whether it be in parks, at school, or in a forest. 
My experience reading Shakepearean plays has shown me that reading
is necessary and fundamental part of grasping the fullness of the works.
I had wanted to read A Midsummer Night's Dream for quite some time.
Besides being a play by Shakespeare, I believe my desire to do so came
from seeing bits and pieces of it done in Hollywood movies like Dead
Poet's Society. I didn't realize how much small exposures like! those
could cause me to prejudge the actual text; after I had read the play
for myself I was surprised at how much the text differed from my
expectations. Not knowing the whole of the plot, but rather only bits
and pieces, I expected a play filled with fairy dust and pixy-women
toe-dancing, laughing, with flowers everywhere, or something like Hylas
and the nymphs. What I did not expect was a group of rag-tag laborers
putting on a play, young females catfighting over their men, or Titania
being enamored of an ass. (Act IV, Scene i, MND)
Even with surprises, though, the text by itself held little detail and richness in my mind.
I thought it a decent play, but certainly nothing like I had hoped, and
I didn't feel involved in it or connected to it in any way. One of the
things that did impressed me, though, was finding out for myself how
accessible Shakespeare actually is. When it came time for me to learn
my lines for Philostrate (MND), I copied them from a site on the
internet which posted the text in its entirety. I realized the!n how
lucky we are that plays like these survived through the ages, sometimes
probably making it from one hand to the next in a form no better than
the paperback I carried in my bag. Through my reading, the importance
of the text was impressed upon me, and I feel that I have gained a new
appreciation for the lasting and foundational qualities of pure script.
Viewing
Viewing a play adds a kind of second dimension to a textual
reading. While our primary impressions of a Shakespearean play are
established with the initial reading, those impressions are challenged
when we come into contact with a play performed. At this point we have
a first hand contrast between how we felt and how someone else felt
about the same play. Once we have sampled another's interpretations we
necessarily question ourselves on what we would have done differently,
had we directed the play. Perhaps something we expected to see on stage
was omitted; perhaps! something unusual was added. We might even sample
the same play dozens of times, all performed by different companies; it
is common, it is even expected, that none of the twelve interpretations
will be much the same. Unlike with reading, with viewing we are not
allowed to sample the play in whatever manner we want. As the audience,
our experiences are directed. We must resign ourselves to be the
two-hour subject of another's whims and methods. 
This kind of challenge
is usually very enlightening, bringing new thoughts and perspectives
where we would otherwise have only our own. These new thoughts and
perspectives often materialize in the form of visual and auditory
details, mostly because the script stays generally the same. Viewing an
actual performance adds depth and detail to what was before only words. 
We are given scenery, costumes, voices, faces, body movements, and other
forms of physical (rather than verbal) expression that contribute to a
particular feel. These types of details are in reality just instances of
the direct!or s influence, interpretations and preferences that cause us
to challenge our initial ideas, and accept us a possibly richer taste of
the play. 
Because I was involved in two scenes of A Midsummer Night's Dream,
viewing this play on film held particular interest for me. I often
found myself looking to the films for ideas on how to play a character,
or a scene. Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately, for originality's
sake), neither of the films we reviewed portrayed A Midsummer Night's
Dream in a way that particularly struck me. The 1935 Reinhardt edition
seemed to me overdone in nearly every respect. The characters were much
too Roman, the actresses quite over-dramatic, the fairies and
black-winged bats far too many in number, and the movie, in general, way
too long. The author of Max Reinhardt and William Dieterle's A
Midsummer Night s Dream described it well as, a vast!
balletic-operatic extravaganza with huge casts, elaborate scenery, and
lavish costumes. (37, Jorgens) Overall it was a very large film. The
BBC version, on the other hand, erred in the opposite. It was slow,
relatively unemotional, and somewhat difficult to watch. After viewing
both these versions, I realized that my perceptions of the text were
much different than either of the films. I wanted something more
normal, less mystical, more possible however, the time for me to voice
those desires had not yet come.
Performing
This third dimension of experiencing Shakespeare comes only when a
reader-turned-viewer decides to become the actor. This aspect of the
Shakespearean experience is nearly the only of the three mentioned that
supports and encourages open creativity and self-expression. Now our
questions of, what would I have done differently have a chance to be
answered. It is in the acting that the text becomes less detached from
us, becoming more our own. We are no longer in !the passive mode, but
the active. Now, we wait for no one, cut lines if we like, say it fast,
draw it out. There are few, if any, limits to how a play can be done.
Performing brings one's original, textual conceptions in synergy with
those viewed of others, creating a play that is both wholly collage, and
wholly new. The play begins to conform to what we, as individuals,
perceive to be the best or most right interpretation of the text. 
After viewing the two film versions of A Midsummer Night's Dream,
I envisioned something much more casual and lighthearted, even funny,
for our own performance of Act III, Scene ii. Because of this, and
probably because of the nature of the cast in general, our group took on
a more youthful, somewhat ridiculous approach to the play. Demetrius
was played by a woman, Lysander dressed in ruffles and knickers, Helena
victimized and shrewish to the extreme, and Hermia was more often than
not stepping into violen!ce. Nevertheless, in some ways we found
ourselves doing exactly the things that we saw in the films. For
example, once performing, it was not difficult to see elements of the
characters we play in us; specifically, we more often than not felt and
appeared like the Rude Mechanicals. We were not unlike them, coming
together with nothing but a script, none of us actors. (Heather the
Grant Writer, Tricia the Administrator, Giselle the Grader, Matt the
Director, all of us students.) Beginning with nothing but bare
Shakepearean text, we assigned roles, gave out scripts, rehearsed, and
performed. 
At Swanton Ranch, The Dream Team stood in a forest to
practice our play, hearing Puck recite, A crew of patches, rude
mechanicals, that work for bread upon Athenian stalls, were met together
to rehearse a play. (Act III, Scene ii, MND) We were much the same.
We even had some hard-hat rude mechanicals accidentally appear in the
background as we spoke! Even before we arrived, though, a place was
sought out f!or us, our director no doubt having thoughts much like
these: Pat, pat; and here's a marvail's convenient place for our
rehearsal. This green plot shall be our stage, this hawthorn brake our
tiring house. (Act III, Scene i, MND) Once done, like the lovers in
the scene, we return to the real world, away from the forest, back to
the realities of work and school: When they next wake, all this
derision shall seem a dream and fruitless vision, and back to Athens
shall the lovers go. (Act III, Scene ii, MND) And so we did.
Although we for the most part succeeded in building our own version of
the play, some similarities like these could not be escaped: I could not
help but notice that the actions taken in the play were mirroring what
was going on in reality.
Through Shakespeare s ability to create
a-play-within-a-play-within-a-play, I found being a rude mechanical 
broadening to my overall impressions of the play-buildi!ng experience.
Seeing our forest performance on film gave an entirely different
perspective still. Some members of the faculty, some friends, and some
strangers came to our screening to see the fruit of our creative weekend
in Swanton Ranch. We put a lot of time and practice into our scene,
making sure that we had our lines, that they flowed right, that we
looked right. We brought the scenes from just a text, clear through to
performance, and were now able to look back over the whole creative
process. In the theatre, however, just before our showing, our
performance somehow seemed less serious to me. I was so afraid that
we were all going to embarrass ourselves! The lines I said when I was
Philostrate suddenly came back to me. No, my noble lord, it is not for
you. I have heard it over, and it is nothing, nothing in the world;
unless you can find sport in their intents, extremely stretched and
conned with cruel pain, to do you service. (Act V, Scene i, MND) Much
like Bottom's company, we were good not because of any phenomenal
talent, but because we tried, because we were simple people trying to do
Shakespeare. Like them, we were not actors, but were still able to
experience the fullness of the creative process, bringing to fruition
our own comedic rendition of A Midsummer Night's Dream. 
Shakespeare
I believe that it is not by accident that our play turned out as
it did. It could not be but that Shakepeare intended for us, the
actors, to relate to Bottom s company, to everyone who ever put on A
Midsummer Night s Dream or any other production. This is part of
Shakepeare s genius: to be able to write into the play a reflection of
ourselves, to see our own creative processes being mirrored by those of
the characters we coarsely attempt to play. Even now, when the actual
performance of our scene is over, I look back through the t!ext and
still see my group in it: when I read the word, Demetrius, I no
longer picture the old Demetrius I first imagined, or even those I saw
in film. Now I see Tricia in her funny pseudo-masculine hat. The play
has somehow become ours. Even if we hadn t put on the play, though, and
felt none of it for ourselves, reading about the rude mechanicals and
their creative process gives a reader valuable insight. Shakespeare did
not just hand down to us a script, expecting the layman to figure out
how to make it happen. Instead, it is as if he included his own little
instruction manual in the play, teaching all who will learn to bring it
from the mere green text to the ripe fruit of performance. 
Personal Notes
The class in retrospect was a very good experience. Before the
quarter began, when I first learned that our class would be taking a
field trip together, I was hesitant. I wasn't sure that I wanted to
spend a weekend away from home, in !a cabin in the hills with my
Shakespeare class. I was not convinced that it would be more than an
uncomfortable experience. I didn't at all expect what actually came out
of it, something that I praise God so much for, which had virtually
nothing to do with Shakespeare at all. The contact that I had with my
group has become invaluable to me this quarter. I got to know people
that weekend that I otherwise would hardly have talked to had I not been
required to spend so much time outside of class with them. Tricia,
Giselle, Matt and I are good friends; how could we be otherwise when we
rehearsed together so often, rode 8 hours in the car together, left
Matt's clothes behind, shopped the sales together at Macy's, ate meals,
and hiked 20 minutes into the forest together? I learned about three
people who share my faith, shared a candy bar with Joel, and did my
classmates' dishes. I saw them from morning to evening in lights and
places so different from the norm. They seem to me pe!ople now, and
friends, not just bodies with mouths in chairs.par Besides being
purely social, going to Swanton Ranch really opened up my educational
experience. Although our actual film isn't going to win any Academy
Awards, it felt like we were doing something real, and not just
commenting on everyone else's work. The air was great, the change was
great, and bringing a play from text to performance gave me a whole new
attitude towards theatrics in general. I learned how much work goes
into doing even just a scene, how many elements there are to look after,
and how much effort it takes to make everything look somewhat believable
and real. Being at the end of the process now, being able to see where
we started from clear through to the finish, I feel like my
understanding of Shakespeare has really broadened. Not so much
Shakespeare himself, of course, but rather what he did, what he tried to
accomplish; I have a much greater sense of what all actors and crew go
through to put a play together, text to performance, start to !finish.
There is a small part of me that wants to keep doing Shakespeare, to do
all of the play, or at least do it again. Another part of me, the more
persuasive and logical part, wants to just keep it all right where it is
in my mind, remembering it fondly, as A Dream.
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Words: 2629
